Parashat Ha Shavua Commentaries

"Now if you will hear, and truly listen, to the voice of God..." (Deut 28:1) Read more...

In American ideology, our bodies belong to us. We should take care of ourselves through proper diet, hygiene, sleep, and exercise, and we should avoid smoking, drugs, and too much alcohol, but those imperatives are only so that we can feel good, look good, and live a long life. If we choose to neglect our bodies or engage in activities that will harm them, that may be unwise but ultimately it is our own business. Read more...

Any of us in the workforce today know that as companies and corporations strive to meet their bottom line and as employees move freely from one company to another, defining the social contract between employee and employer has intensified and become more complex. As each side protects its own interests, trust and loyalty between employees and employers has become increasingly challenging. While not the only issue, this often plays out in the pay structure and practices. Today, it is not uncommon for companies to delay payment for work until a job is completely done. Read more...

American Ecological-Anthropologist Roy Rappaport (1926-1997) taught me today that "The linguistic capacity that is central to human adaptation makes it possible to give birth to concepts that come to possess those who have conceived them, concepts like… heaven and hell." This understanding made me smile and gave academic language to that which I heard years ago from my teacher, Reb Shlomo Carlebach (1925-1994; hard not to see the close parallels the years they were both granted life). Read more...

Several years ago, our daughter, Hannah, spent the summer working at Camp Ramah in Ojai, California. She had two jobs that summer – most she worked in the office, but she also served as the “prayer coordinator” for the “Giborei Yisrael edah,” the group of campers going into 6th grade. Being on staff (as opposed to being a camper) means that one is allowed to have a cell phone at camp, and so she called home every so often to check in and let us know how she was doing. Mostly on these calls, she sounded tired – happy, but exhausted; camp is hard work. Read more...